15

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‌CHAPTER 15

15 January 1979 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

Deva means divine, aviram means continuity, continuum, flow. Life is a divine continuum, it has no beginning and no end. It is forever and forever; it has always been there and will always be there. Birth and death are only episodes in it; it doesn’t start with birth, it doesn’t end with death. To know it is to know god.

God is nothing but the total life energy, this whole ocean of life. Expressions are millions, but it is one energy that is expressed. We are it, but unless we turn in, we will never be able to know. If we go on rushing outwards we will never be able to understand the truth, the fundamental truth, of existence. Because we miss it we remain in fear, and because we miss it we are constantly under the shadow of death. And to live under the shadow of death is not to live. How can one celebrate when death is there, how can one be festive when death is there, and when death is coming closer and closer every moment?

Life becomes a celebration the moment you know that there is no death, that you have always been here and you will always be here.

Pravaho means riverlike change. Change is the only permanent thing in existence. Everything else changes except change, and the moment we start stopping it we create misery. To remain blissful simply means to remain available to change; if there is no resistance to change, life is bliss. Misery comes only in the same proportion as resistance.

Resistance means that you have lost trust in life, you have lost trust in the whole, you are trying to be wiser than the whole. You are trying to impose your expectations, you are trying to have a private destiny separate from the whole; and that’s what anxiety is.

The basic meaning of sannyas is to go with the flow, to be so totally one with the flow that there is no question of any resistance. Let-go is sannyas, to live in utter relaxation is sannyas; to live in

absolute acceptance is sannyas. Whatsoever life brings is a gift and one has to be thankful for it, even though it is not according to one’s expectations, even though it is not according to one’s plans.

Life listens to nobody; it follows its own course. If we fight with it, we become miserable; if we go with it, there is great benediction.

Gramyo means as simple as a villager, as simple as a primitive, as simple as man is – uncultured, uncivilised – as we come into the world. We all come like pure, innocent mirrors, reflecting all, but with no thoughts inside.

In the end, one has to become a child again; then the journey is complete, then the circle is perfect. One has to come back to that early moment of birth. If before death comes we can manage to reach to that early moment of birth, that innocence, then life has been a fulfillment. Then there is no death: you enter into eternity.

Jesus says again and again: Unless you are like a child you will not enter into my kingdom of god. Each one has to lose his childhood; that is part of growth, part of maturity. But then it has to be regained; and when it is regained it is not the same childhood, it is far richer. A child is not only innocent, he is ignorant too. But when a person comes back after a whole life’s experiences of joy and sadness and failures and successes, and all that life makes available, good and bad, summers and winters; when one has come all the way, knowing every kind of experience, tasting every kind of possibility, going through all kinds of spaces, tasting both hell and heaven; when one comes back and again becomes a child – this is simple innocence with no ignorance in it. It is wisdom.

A child is innocence plus ignorance, and a sage is innocence plus wisdom. Life gives wisdom, but if one remains enclosed in that wisdom then one has not been a perfect circle, something remained missing. Unless wisdom helps you to become innocent again, god cannot be known.

It is possible, it can happen, and you are ready for it. The time has also come. Everything happens in its own time, and nothing is more powerful than an idea whose time has comeBecome a child

again.

Subuddha means absolute awareness, perfect awareness. And that is the work to be done. Don’t live in a state of unconsciousness any more; try to wake up, make every effort to wake up. In the beginning it is difficult, because to change the whole pattern of many many lives is bound to be difficult – but only in the beginning. Once the ice is broken, things become very simple; the first breakthrough is difficult.

So go on hammering, in every possible way. Whatsoever you are doing, try to be aware of it. Walking, walk with awareness; eating, eat with awareness; listening, listen with awareness. Whatsoever you are doing, bring the quality of awareness to it. You will lose it again and again; for a few seconds it will be there, and gone. Again after minutes you will become aware of your unawareness. Then don’t feel bad, don’t feel guilty. It is not a sin to be unaware; it is simply foolish to be unaware, not a sin.

But we have lived in that kind of foolishness for millions of lives, so it has become a deep, ingrained habit. There is no need to repent, because repenting and feeling guilty is making it more

complicated. Whenever you remember that you have forgotten to remember, start remembering again, become aware again. Again you will forget: bring yourself back again. Go on hammering; again and again go on bringing yourself to awareness. Slowly slowly the momentum gathers, and one day suddenly the clouds have dispersed and there is sunlight.

That sunlight is the first taste of Buddhahood, of Christ-consciousness. And that first taste changes your whole life: you are no more the same person. Although you will look the same you are no more the same. Your circumference remains the same but your centre has changed. Your centre has become the centre of light, and slowly slowly your circumference will also radiate, will become luminous.

Sudipo means well lit, well-illumined, luminous.

Man can exist either as darkness or as light. It depends what we choose, it is our choice; both the alternatives are open. Millions of people choose to live in darkness because darkness offers a few things, gives a few things. which light cannot give; in fact light takes many things away from you. In darkness all kinds of illusions are possible, hallucinations are possible, dreams are possible. In darkness the ego can exist; in light all illusions disappear, all hallucinations disappear, all imagination disappears. Finally, even the ego is not found. One is, but not as ‘I am’; one is just pure isness.

Hence people choose to live in darkness – it gives a feeling of ‘I am’, and it gives many many desires and projects to be fulfilled. It gives you a great hope of achievement, of ambition for the future.

Light simply takes away everything of the mind. Light leaves you in utter emptiness, but that emptiness is immensely valuable because god descends only in that emptiness.

Choose light! It needs guts to choose light, because it is a kind of suicide, the ego commits suicide. But when you are not, god is. So in one way it is committing suicide, in another way it is resurrection: the momentary life disappears and the eternal life begins.

The way towards light is meditation, and the way towards darkness is mind. Darkness consists of thoughts, desires, dreams; light consists of silence, no thought, no desire, just being utterly in the herenow. Immediately something flares up within you and you are full of light.

That is the meaning of sudipo.

[Bodhimitra: a friend of enlightenment, a seeker, a lover of enlightenment.]

This has been your search for the whole of your life; you have been groping for it, you have tried in every possible way. And all those efforts have not failed: they have brought you here.

When one looks backwards, one can always see that nothing has ever been a wastage. Even those few moments when one had gone astray, even they have contributed something immensely valuable; even mistakes and errors are necessary parts of growth. You are here because of all that you have done in the past: good, bad, right, wrong.

So in the ultimate reckoning even wrong is not wrong because it helps the right; without it the right cannot exist. Without darkness there is no possibility of light. Then one simply feels grateful for all

that life has been, with no choice – not that this has been good and this has not been good; all has been good. Everything falls into a harmony.

And the moment has come for that harmony. Now something immensely valuable is going to happen. It is time to collect all that you have lived in fragments. It is time to put all that you have known together so that an integration arises in you.

I am here to help you just to be yourself. I have nothing to impose on you; sannyas is not an imposition. It is not that you have to follow me: sannyas simply means that you have fallen in love with me. Now there is no question of following; it is not something that you have to do, it will happen of its own accord.

Sannyas is creating a bridge between one who has arrived and one who is arriving. And not much work is needed. Life really is a simple affair, a very simple affair. It is the theologians and the scholars and the priests who have made it very complicated.

I am here just to enhance something that is already in you, to provoke it, to make it afire. Everything that you need is there; it just has to be put in the right order, in a certain harmony. Then immediately you will be surprised.

Life is like a jigsaw puzzle: all the parts are there, but topsy-turvy – they have to be put right. And it is a simple phenomenon; if one has put his own parts together, he can help anybody to put his parts together, because they are the same. It is the same puzzle, there is no difference at all.

That’s why there is the possibility of a master, otherwise there would have been no possibility. Because the puzzle is the same, the master is possible; and because the puzzle is the same, the disciple is possible. If your puzzle was different from my puzzle, then there would be no possibility of helping you. It is the same puzzle, exactly the same puzzle.

[The new sannyasin has booked for several groups, and Osho suggests Tantra, which he is a little afraid of.]

Very good! This is the time to be playful about everything!

No, there is no need to be afraid. Just be playful! In fact only when you are old enough can you understand the secrets of Tantra. Younger people can’t understand. Younger people, in the name of Tantra, are simply hiding their desire for sexuality. They cannot yet understand, they are too young to understand. Only an older person can see the whole play of energy.

I have given it to you knowing that it will take your fear away from you and you will feel very free. We have lived in a very very repressive society and our unconscious is full of taboos, inhibitions; they all have to be dropped so that one becomes utterly empty.

So just be playfully there! Don’t make it a serious thing – it is not a serious thing. Nothing is serious with me!

Devada means a gift of god. Life is a gift, but we take it for granted; hence we don’t feel any thankfulness. And not to feel thankfulness is to be irreligious; to feel thankfulness is to be religious. Thankfulness is the very core of religion.

And life is such a precious gift; each moment is so precious, so ultimately significant, meaningful, that not to be grateful should be almost impossible.

But people are not grateful, because they never contemplate on life, on what it has given to them, what beauties it has made available, what tremendous, incredible experiences, what miracles, have been happening all around. Because they don’t contemplate, they live a bored life. Otherwise at each step you will find surprises. Each small thing contains universes within it, and each single moment eternity knocks at your door. If you are silent you can hear the footsteps of god; if you are silent you can hear the still, small voice within. And then only one thing remains – to be grateful. That gratefulness becomes your prayer.

One need not be a Christian or a Hindu or a Mohammedan, one need only be grateful: that contains all.

[A sannyasin says that he feels blocked in being open to relationship and love. He has done a few groups which have helped]

It will go; there is nothing to worry about, not at all. When can you come back again?

... Just start making a few efforts. It seems to have just become a habit; I don’t see any block. It may be just a habit, and a habit is not a block; a habit is only a programming. You need to re-programme yourself, that’s all. Just make a few efforts.

In the beginning it will look as if you are making some effort against yourself. You are not making any effort against yourself; you are making some effort against a programme with which you have become identified. In fact, you are making some effort for your real self. So make a few efforts. They will be a little haphazard because you will be going against the pattern that you have lived; but once you have started moving, the programme will be dropped. It is simply a programme, not a block.

A block is a more difficult problem. If it were a block then much work would be needed; but I don’t see that. It is just a programme; and many people programme themselves this way, because it is safer.

For a man the woman is a danger, just as a man is a danger for a woman. The danger is that you are getting involved with someone who is not like you, who is just the opposite. A man and a woman are polar opposites. And whenever you make a contact with the opposite, fear is natural, because that means that you are moving with something unknown, with something that you can never understand; hence the attraction and hence the fear. The attraction of the unknown and the fear of the unknown are both together.

Now, there are two possibilities: one can love the attraction of the unknown more; then one programmes in one way. One can love the security of the known, then one programmes in a different way. You have programmed for security rather than for life, for safety rather than for adventure.

It is simply a question of programming. Start re-programming! Make friends, move, take initiative. Just as you are afraid, women are afraid of you; so somebody has to take the initiative. And women

are more afraid because they have been exploited so much. They are suspicious, and their suspicion is based on experience. They have been destroyed so much down the ages that man looks almost like the enemy. They are more afraid of you, they will not take the initiative; you will have to take the initiative.

The meeting between man and woman is of immense value. It teaches you how to be whole, it teaches you how to commune. And this is the beginning of an inner integration. First you have to meet with the outer woman; if you are capable of that then one day you will be able to meet with the inner woman. And the meeting with the inner woman is samadhi. Then both your parts, your inner polarities, dissolve into one; and that brings such orgasmic joy!

In the meeting with the outer woman or outer man you will have only glimpses of it. When you meet with the inner, it becomes a state, not a glimpse. It remains with you, it abides with you, it becomes your very flavour. But the beginning has to happen from the outside. If you are afraid of the outer woman, what to say about the inner? You will be more afraid.

Hence Tantra is one of the fundamental sciences to be learned. Meeting with the outer woman is the beginning of Tantra, and meeting with the inner woman is the end of Tantra.

Make a few efforts. And if you are not capable, then next time you come, just remind me. I will put a few women after you!

[A sannyasin who is leaving says: The first time I sat here it was like a shock, something like that; my breathing stopped. Now I feel a lot of joy.]

Good! It happens: slowly slowly you get accustomed to my energy and slowly slowly you relax with my energy. In the beginning resistance is there, that’s why the trouble. It takes time for trust to grow. And the whole question is of trust: the more you trust, the more things will happen to you. If you can trust absolutely, then in this very moment all that is needed will have happened.

This will be the name for the centre: Udgatri. Udgatri means a singer of divine songs. And that’s what my centres have to become – singers of divine songs. Create more and more singing and dancing in people, create love. Help people to be more human; that is the only way towards god, to be more human.

Prem Maya means love magic, the magic of love. Love is magical: whatsoever it touches it transforms into gold. Even if mud is touched by love, immediately lotuses start growing.

Love is the greatest magic in the world, the magical force, and one who knows love is a magician.

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